HARRISBURG — A 49-year-old upper Dauphin County woman pleaded guilty to third-degree murder Thursday for the August 2012 fatal shooting of her ex-husband, a slaying that police said she initially tried to bill as a case of self-defense.

Gina Anne Murphy could spend decades behind bars for killing 52-year-old Daniel Murphy at the Williamstown house they shared. County President Judge Todd A. Hoover scheduled her sentencing for January after she entered her plea during the brief hearing.

First Assistant District Attorney Fran Chardo said Gina Murphy has no sentencing deal with the prosecution. Her open plea to the murder count, as well as to charges of tampering with evidence and making sworn and unsworn false statements to investigators, guarantees her a state prison term, Chardo said.

He said the decision to accept a third-degree murder plea — she could have faced a life prison sentence had she gone to trial and been convicted of a higher degree of homicide — was reached after consulting with the victim's family.

Daniel Murphy

"We thought this was the right thing to do," Chardo said.

Gina Murphy's attorney, Jerry Russo, declined to comment pending her sentencing. Russo had earlier contended that his client was the victim of years of domestic abuse.

Gina Murphy was charged in January 2013, four months after the slaying, as the result of a county grand jury investigation.

State police contended that she deliberately shot her ex-husband in the heart with a .22 caliber pistol to obtain sole ownership of the home where they lived. They claimed she then placed a steak knife beside Daniel Murphy's body.

During initial police interviews, Gina Murphy insisted she shot her ex-husband because he had attacked her with the knife, investigators said.

Police said they found that, although they divorced 15 years before the slaying and were both legally married to other people, Gina and Daniel Murphy lived together in the house at 461 E. Market St. They posed as husband and wife to file a deed to the property a year before the killing, investigators said.

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